


Head First

by AvataroftheVast



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Character Death, Statement, the backstory of an avatar
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-02
Updated: 2019-03-02
Packaged: 2019-11-07 19:28:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17966606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AvataroftheVast/pseuds/AvataroftheVast
Summary: Statement of Alicia Ward, regarding an experience while falling. Statement begins.An avatar origin story. May possibly become part of a series of origin stories for beings that serve the various different entities.





	Head First

Statement by: Alicia Ward  
Date of statement: 6 November 2014  
Regarding: An experience while falling

I've always been a bit of a thrill seeker. Some use the term adrenaline junkie. I've always loved to go white water rafting, skiing, or out to theme parks. Anything that will get my blood pumping. My favorite such activity has always been high ropes courses.

I remember the first time I ever did a ropes course. I was twelve. It was part of a school trip, one where we also did team building exercises, and learned survival skills. The whole day I had been looking forward to the 50 foot high ropes course. I bragged incessantly to my best friend about how great I would be at it. 

When the time finally came and I was suited up in helmet at harness, I was jumping with excitement. The first obstacle was a large net ladder up to the first platform, high in a tree. I started clambering up. However, I hadn't even reached half way when I started to slow. It definitely looked much higher from above, and I had never before experienced - at least in this intensity - the sick feeling in your stomach that comes from feeling like you could plummet to the earth any second. The higher I climbed, the tighter I gripped the ropes, and the slower I moved, until it was a serious mental effort to lift my foot from one rope to the next.

The assistant at the top helped me onto the wooden platform, though I was reluctant to let go of my handholds. As soon as I was upright - before, even - my arms were wrapped around the trunk of the tree. As I looked down from my 50 foot perch, my heart was pumping so hard I could feel it pounding the inside of my rib cage, and feel it pulse in my neck. Cautiously, I tipped my head over the edge and looked down. Everyone on the ground looked so small, and suddenly for a second, I felt like I was already falling.

I gasped and gripped the tree tighter. The course assistant encouraged me onwards, but I was too scared to let go of the tree. I wanted to do it; I really did, but I was terrified. After a couple minutes of holding up the line of kids waiting to do the ropes course, the assistant told me that if I wanted to get down, it could only be now, or at the end. I looked at the next obstacle. A single rope, with two rope handholds. And there I made a decision I would regret for years.

I decided to climb down.

The second my feet touched the ground, I was filled with regret; and not because I looked bad in front of the friend I had bragged to who now teased me mercilessly. It was because I wanted to do it again. I wanted to feel that feeling again, and instead of fighting it, I wanted to throw myself into it and be embraced by it; that thrill of feeling like at any moment I could go plummeting. 

I became obsessed with finding that feeling again. Any time my family went anywhere, I would be climbing on the tallest thing I could find. I got in trouble at school for climbing on top of the roof of the playground. I climbed trees, feeling my heart pound yet again as I carefully pulled myself out on to branches I wasn't sure could hold my weight. 

When I got older, I did more high ropes courses, any time I could find a chance or reason to. Eventually I got a job working at one. I found that the key to getting past the fear was not to fight it, but to dive into it, letting myself feel every bit of it, head to toe, and soon, I began to crave more. I avoided any course less than 30 feet high, and ones where the rope attached to the harness was too short. If the rope was too short, I could feel it tug and pull as I moved, and when it did that I would feel more secure. It reminded me that I was tied safely and snugly to this system of ropes and ladders, and I didn't want that. I wanted to imagine that with a single misstep I would fall. I even came to resent the safety rope, wishing I could take it off. But for legal reasons, that isn't allowed, not even for staff.

One year, my sister and I went hiking up a mountain. I remember the view from the top, looking out over the valley below. From that vantage, the area below and the vast expanse above merged in my mind and suddenly it was like I realized for the first time how overwhelmingly enormous that space was. The sky no longer seemed like some arbitrary ceiling above my head, it was all around me, below me, behind me. And it felt like it was calling to me.

I leaned toward my sister and told her that I wished I could just leap off the mountain and go soaring across the valley. She looked at me with an amused smirk and said, "That's called hang gliding."

So that was our next adventure. Hang gliding. My sister was very hesitant. She was all for hiking, canoeing, or other outdoor adventures, but being so high in the air made her nervous. However, she was willing to humor me when she saw how excited I was for it. So, we signed up for lessons. And as we prepared for our first flight, each in a tandem glider with an instructor, I was tingling with excitement. My sister seemed tense, but she gave me her best smile. Then we were off, and I felt that wonderfully intoxicating sensation of my stomach dropping as the ground dropped out from under me.

We were in the air, and I once again felt that incredible feeling of the sky surrounding me completely; I was a small speck being swallowed in it like a goldfish in the ocean. I laughed in glee as I felt more free than I ever had before, flying high above the planet below. But still it felt like the sky was calling me. And then I realized, it didn't just feel like it, it *was* calling me! I became aware of not just the sky around me, but of everything that it filled, the vast expanse of space that sits above and surrounds our whole planet and stretches on into infinity. That beautiful, empty space where you were more free than anywhere on earth. It was alive. I knew it; I felt it. The whole universe thrummed with its presence, and _it called to me_.

Because see, I hadn't yet given myself to it fully. It wanted more of me, just as I wanted more of it. So without a second thought, I undid the straps tying me to the last safety between me and the sky, much to my instructor’s protests, and I fell. I heard the terrified screaming from my sister above as she watched me fall, but I only laughed louder, filled with the wonder of how I felt. The thrill and rush were intoxicating. I let myself tumble through the air, enjoying the freedom of motion that I had, feeling myself become a part of the vastness around me. Eventually I steadied myself, and grinned at the ground. As I did so, I realized that though I felt the wind on my face, heard the wind screaming past my ears, and my hair trailed wildly above me, the ground was only getting farther away. I laughed again, knowing that whatever the presence was that called me, it had embraced me.

I'm not sure how, but some time later, I woke up on the ground. I wasn't anywhere near where I had fallen from my glider, nor was I anywhere along our planned route. In fact I was not far outside my home town. 

I didn't bother going home. And I didn't bother checking back with my family. I had found something so far beyond family that family was insignificant. But I occasionally still watched my family, just out of curiosity. I watched my own funeral from afar after my body was never found. My sister, I observed, had developed a tremendous fear of heights and flying. She and I had always been very close. 

But you can't avoid flying forever. Eventually the day came where she was going to have to take a plane. I wasn't ever able to find out why, but for whatever reason, she was flying to Germany. I bought a ticket for the same flight, a seat near the very back. She was towards the middle, in a window seat. Unfortunate positioning for her, but the plane was nearly full, so she likely had few options when she booked. For her the day of the flight also had been very important; it had to be a clear day with no storms and little predicted wind. So she was stuck with the window seat. 

As our flight took off, I watched her closely from the back and waited. And waited. Finally it came. The sky darkened, far faster and far darker than it ever should have, especially when clear skies had been forecast. A wind started up, and the plane began to rock. I could see her breathing rapidly. The pilot came on the intercom to apologize and calm the passengers, but I could tell my sister was not reassured. I watched my sister closely, eager to see how she would choose to respond.

The wind became wild. Heavy raindrops pummeled the sides of the plane. The plane was rocking, lurching, and bumping in the most terrifying ways, and worried whispers filled the cabin. I could see my sister was now in tears, her face in a pillow. I shook my head in disappointment. I stood up and walked down the aisle toward my sister, and as I did, a lightning bolt shot past the plane, only a couple hundred feet out. There was a chorus of screams from the passengers, including my sister who shot upright in terror. When she did, she saw me in the aisle next to her, and I just gave her another sad shake of my head. I'll never forget the look of shock, fear, and confusion in her eyes.

The next lightning strike hit the plane; an engine, and the plane was downed. There were no survivors, but the bodies of two of the passengers were never found. My sister’s, and, well, mine. Because you see, you can't hide from or avoid that fear of falling, you have to dive into it head first.


End file.
